Kolkata Knight Riders, who
are currently placed sixth on the points table, need a big win when they face
Lucknow Super Giants, who are placed third on the points table, at the DY Patil
Stadium in Mumbai on Wednesday.
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KKR now have 12 points with
seven losses and six wins. A win alone will not be enough for the franchise to
keep their playoff hope alive, however. They will need to win by a big margin and hope
that other playoff contenders falter.
LSG, on the other hand, are
an inch closer to a playoffs berth as they are already in top-four with 16
points. But with a number of teams competing for the remaining three berths,
they will go for the kill to collect two points to cement their place in the
knockouts.
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Two-time IPL champions KKR
played the final last season but lost to Chennai Super Kings. The Kolkata side
managed to keep their chances alive after getting better off Mumbai Indians and
SunRisers Hyderabad.
Captain Shreyas Iyer yet
again rode on all-rounder Andre Russell’s brilliant performance with bat and
ball. As bowlers also contributed, KKR registered a comprehensive 54-run win
over SRH in their last match.
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KKR will miss Ajinkya Rahane
and Pat Cummins since both of them were ruled out for the remainder of the
season.
LSG, on the other hand, are
coming into the match after suffering two successive defeats and will have to
put up an improved show to end things on a high.
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The main concern for LSG is
their poor batting show in the last two matches with the batters struggling in
the powerplay against quality bowling.
LSG’s batting is a lot
dependent on skipper KL Rahul, who has done the bulk of the scoring with two
hundreds but he has been off-colour in the last three games.
Opener Quinton de Kock, who
has scored three half-centuries, too has been dismissed for 11 and 7 in the
last two games, which added to the team’s woes.
However, Deepak Hooda has
been rock solid and it was his fifty that kept LSG in the hunt in the last
game.
Young Ayush Badoni too will
be eager to prove he is not a one-game wonder, while Krunal Pandya also has to
step up in the rear end of the tournament.
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LSG will also look to use
Marcus Stoinis better as he is one of the most prolific all-rounders in world
cricket.
Bowling has proved to be the
weak link for LSG though the likes of Avesh Khan and Jason Holder have
delivered with 17 and 14 wickets so far but Mohsin Khan was taken to the
cleaners in the last game.
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Spinner Ravi Bishnoi picked
up two wickets against Rajasthan Royals and LSG would expect him to keep things
tight in the middle overs on Wednesday.
